bitchy | Sophie Chandauka wrote to Duchess Meghan, inviting her to the 2024 polo match

At some point in the past year or two, royal reporter Richard Palmer left/got pushed out of a relatively cushy gig at the Daily Express. Nowadays, he makes a few bucks writing weekly (or maybe bi-monthly) royal summaries of what’s been happening in the extended British royal universe. Like most current and former rota reporters, Palmer has found that there’s much more interest and money in covering the Duke and Duchess of Sussex rather than the left-behinds. His piece this week is unsurprisingly all about the Sussexes, Sentebale, As Ever and Netflix. There’s a lot of regurgitation of British tabloid reporting (eyeroll), but Palmer has some new info about Sophie Chandauka and her very bizarre claims, especially the claim about the Duchess of Sussex showing up to a Sentebale polo fundraiser unannounced.

Despite the drama and controversy, these have been just another crazy few days in the lives of Harry and Meghan. They are perhaps the world’s most marmite couple – so much so that the fifth anniversary last Monday of the official end of their lives as working members of the Royal Family went largely unremarked.

They have been damaged by the fallout from the crisis at Sentebale, where Chandauka, a 47-year-old Zimbabwean lawyer, has levelled accusations of racism and misogynoir – discrimination against black women – at the primarily white people previously running the charity, accusing Harry of harassment and bullying as well as labelling it a vanity project. Worse, she has blamed the toxicity of the Sussex brand for her inability to find new sponsors for the charity, which helps young people in Lesotho and Botswana, two impoverished nations where more than one in five adults are HIV positive, and the unemployment rate is 16 and 23 per cent respectively.

In a succession of claims and counterclaims, further information has come to light, The i Paper can reveal, challenging some of Chandauka’s version of events.

Sources close to the former trustees, whose resignations came after Chandauka lost their confidence and refused to quit, pointed out that, despite her claims that the Sussexes’ toxicity made it impossible to find sponsors, Sentebale was almost entirely reliant on money from Harry’s polo games and a $1.5m (£1.2m) donation from the proceeds of his memoir Spare.

In addition, there are questions about claims Chandauka made in a television interview with Sky’s Trevor Phillips last Sunday. She complained that Meghan had made a surprise appearance which had disrupted a polo tournament in Wellington, Florida, in April 2024, while Harry’s insistence on bringing a Netflix camera crew, something she felt awkward about, had earlier lost the charity a polo venue in Miami.

It has now been claimed by sources that Chandauka had personally written to Meghan to invite her to the polo and that Harry’s friend Nacho Figueras had secured the alternative venue to the financial advantage of Sentebale after the original hosts in Miami had increased the costs. Chandauka confirmed the invitation but said she and the Sentebale team were informed less than 24 hours in advance of Meghan’s attendance.

Furthermore, video footage has come to light showing that Chandauka welcomed Netflix’s participation. “It’s a great platform and profile. The Netflix brand is globally recognised, and any opportunity to tell the story of Sentebale in the context of a global brand such as Netflix is obviously exciting for us,” Chandauka said at the time.

Much has been made of the awkward exchanges when Meghan asked Chandauka to move away from Harry on the presentation podium after the match. However, the video soundtrack reveals the Duchess asking politely: “Do you want to come over here?”

Both Chandauka and Harry have welcomed the Charity Commission’s decision to examine the running of Sentebale. The commission, the voluntary sector’s watchdog, will weigh up the claims and counterclaims and check whether the charity’s former and current trustees, including Chandauka, have fulfilled their legal responsibilities. If there is any evidence of wrongdoing, it could lead to a more severe statutory inquiry, under which bank accounts can be investigated and replacement staff brought in to run the charity.

[From The i Paper]

“However, the video soundtrack reveals the Duchess asking politely: ‘Do you want to come over here?’” – that is NOT NEW INFO. We had the audio last year! That was why it was always unhinged for people to claim that Meghan was rude to Chandauka in that moment – she was politely asking Chandauka to place herself where there was room. Now, there are other angles which have been “revealed” in recent days which show that Meghan wasn’t even the only person on the platform motioning at Chandauka to move. Other people were trying to get her to move away from Harry and into the center of the group. What could have been a minor and inconsequential ten seconds of chaos has been willfully turned into a referendum of Meghan’s character, and cited by Chandauka as the “start” of her falling out with the Sussexes.

As for trustees revealing that Chandauka apparently personally invited Meghan to the polo match… what I don’t get is why would Chandauka even need to personally invite Meghan, and why was anyone surprised that Meghan would support her husband at a charity polo match? But yeah, big shock, Chandauka lied and misrepresented. And she was happy to have Netflix there AND Nacho secured a better deal for Sentebale. AND she spent $600K on bullsh-t “consultants.”

Photos courtesy of Cover Images.